Danielle Levy

Why must Edward Snowden either be a hero or a traitor? Why must we categorize people and events into sound bites that distort and deflect reality? Let’s say he had the good motives he says he had, couldn’t we still recognize the harm of what he did, including complicating existing tensions between the U.S. and China, or the erosion of trust with our government? The latter may not be surprising, for Snowden, like Assange before him and to some degree Bradley Manning, deeply distrust government. And further their view of security and privacy does seem to be shaped accordingly. In all three cases, and each in their respective way, they appear a curious mixture of being both willing and unwitting martyrs to their cause, implying, if one gives them all benefits of doubt, that they acted from principles. Principles are important, but it is far better when they coexist with wisdom. In all three cases, there are questions as to how much wisdom they displayed.

A study by the non partisan CBO (Congressional Business Office) discovered that income tax breaks disproportionately benefit higher income households. It found that the top ten tax breaks, are “distributed unevenly across the income scale.” Those earning $450,000 or more, representing the top 1% of households, received more than17% of the savings in 2013. In four of the areas studied, for example, employer sponsored health insurance, capital gains on assets transferred at death, mortgage interest, and charitable contributions, the tax code benefits those in the higher income levels. The income spread was divided into five levels and taking charitable contributions as an illustration, those with the highest earnings, the highest fifth, or 84%, benefited the most. 11% of the next level benefited, 4% of the third, 1% of the second and 0% of the level representing households with the lowest earnings. Not surprisingly, mortgage interest had a similar spread. As discussions on the budget, the deficit, the debt ceiling and reforming the tax code take place, from Washington to our living rooms, these figures are something we ought to know if we want to understand what’s going on.

A long expose on prostitution in Der Spiegel uncovers evidence that legal prostitution in Germany may indirectly be fueling sex trafficking. The current number of brothels is estimated to have grown to be between 3000 and 3500 with some 200,000 girls working as prostitutes. It is now a business of about 1.5 billion Euros. Most of the girls come from Romania and Bulgaria, areas where it is hard for them to make a living. They are tricked, sometimes locked up, usually threatened, asked to pay the pimp 800 Euros a week, have 30 customers a day, work up to 18 hours, at times in fenced parking like stalls, still with cement floors. Some brothels advertised all the sex you want in any way you want for however long you want for 100 Euros ($129). One such ad had 1700 responses and online comments afterwards complained that some of the girls gave out after a few hours—men sometimes take drugs to increase performance. The expose goes on with horrendous details and stories detailing the unexpected effect of the law that made prostitution legal. The impetus had been to help and protect sex workers, now because the law decriminalized or minimized certain aspects of prostitution, the long list of abuses related to the suspected sex trafficking are harder to prove and therefore prosecute. In our efforts to combat sex trafficking, and in our beginning to treat prostitutes as victims instead of criminals, we shouldn’t forget Germany’s experience.